An international group of doctors have concluded that statins are a potentially dangerous waste of time and are totally ineffective at preventing heart disease.

Doctors, from Britain, the US, France and Ireland, said the very theory on which statins are based (that lowering ‘bad’ LDL cholesterol can cut heart disease) is ‘fundamentally flawed’ and that the side effects far outweigh any perceived benefits.

Writing in the Prescriber medical journal, they said the side-effects of statins may be far more common than major studies suggest – and called for companies and academics to publish their raw data so others could independently analyse the results.

Others last night dismissed their claims – and said the evidence that statins save lives is ‘overwhelming’.

Most cardiologists think cholesterol-busting statin pills are a cheap, safe and effective way of preventing heart attacks and strokes among an ageing and increasingly obese population.

But many others are uneasy about prescribing drugs to patients ‘just in case’ they have heart problems later on. And authors of the new piece, led by London cardiologist Dr Aseem Malhotra, question whether they are even as effective as thought, claiming the ‘cholesterol con’ has led to ‘overmedication’ of millions.

Instead, they say, clinicians should focus on diet and lifestyle.

The authors, including Dr John Abramson, of Harvard Medical School, cite research published earlier this year which found no link between high LDL-cholesterol levels and heart deaths among over-60s.

In the article entitled The Great Cholesterol Con, they wrote: ‘A lack of an association between LDL cholesterol and cardiovascular disease in those over 60 years from a recent systematic review suggests that the conventional cholesterol hypothesis is fundamentally flawed.’